Transfer Preempts

[inquiry]

Riichard,

 

Well, part of what I want to do is explore things like best defense. I happen to like pass then double as penatly. I like pass then rebid 3NT as minor two suiter. I like nonleapoing michales. I am not sure I like 3H as takeout, but 3Dx as cooperative penalty double imaybe ok. I thave to think about it. I tihink, however 3Dx should show diamonds, to prevent the 3Dxppp when opener has diamonds....

 

Ben

[awm]

My statistics indicate that the strong hands are surprisingly frequent -- up to 1 out of 3 transfer preempt openings if your three level bids are always seven card suits, or a bit worse if you often preempt six carders.

 

The loss of 3♣ as a preempt is significant, but you could certainly revise the system to include 2NT as either weak with clubs or a two suiter (basically what Ben originally proposed). If you're playing a strong club system, or certain versions of multi, you don't really need a 2NT opening and this bid is basically free.

 

So I think the real questions to be answered are:

 

(1) How much do you win/lose when you open a transfer preempt with a strong hand?

(2) How much do you win/lose when you open a transfer preempt with a weak hand?

 

I think we can agree that (1) is more wins than losses and (2) is more losses than wins. Of course, (2) especially depends a LOT on how your opponents defend the method. Then we need to weigh these things by the relative frequencies (case 2 is 2-3 times more frequent). Still haven't seen any examples of what happens at the table when opener has the weak hand and opponents have some reasonable defense in place.

 

I'd suggest the following defense:

 

Direct seat Pass = either a weak hand, or a strong single suiter

Direct seat X = cards, usually balanced around 14/15+ points, promises some cards in the actual bids suit (but Hxx is enough); this encourages partner to make a light takeout double after the transfer is accepted.

Direct seat bid (not accept of the xfer) = competitive, not super-strong

Direct seat "accept" of transfer = stopper ask, same as 2♥-3♥ for example

Direct seat 3NT = to play, but serious values (not the hands where you "guess" a 3NT on 16 bal)

 

If direct seat passes, then partner basically bids as if the weak bid was opened. After direct seat X and accept of transfer, partner is encouraged to act with light values. If direct seat passes and transfer accepted, no need to be super-aggressive with takeout shape.

 

In balancing seat after 3♦-P-3♥-P-P or the like:

 

Double = balancing takeout, weakish and good shape

Suit bid = a GOOD hand, forcing to game (otherwise would've bid directly to compete over strong hand possibility)

 

Double then double again is also takeout, but shows sound values.

 

Playing this defense, I don't see any real losses when compared to non-transfer weak hands. The person in direct seat gets to distinguish strength, gets to make stopper asks that usually aren't possible, and you can penalize a bit more often because of the value-showing double (which encourages partner's light takeout double in hrothgar's example). You avoid some of the blind guess 3NT bids after a 3-level preempt.

[Gerben42]

There is an important selection effect. If you have the weak variant and you are not in 1st seat, opponents are more likely to open in front of you than when you have the strong variation.

 

For example in 3rd seat:

The frequency of 6 - 9 HCP = 21.4% and no longer 32.8%

The frequency of 17+ HCP = 14.3% and no longer 5.5%

[inquiry]

There is an important selection effect. If you have the weak variant and you are not in 1st seat, opponents are more likely to open in front of you than when you have the strong variation.

 

For example in 3rd seat:

The frequency of 6 - 9 HCP = 21.4% and no longer 32.8%

The frequency of 17+ HCP = 14.3% and no longer 5.5%

This selection affect is true. In fact, third seat is most frequently strongly hand, and third seat does have more frequent strong than first seat.

 

Ben

[Free]

yes, in 3rd seat you have a lot higher frequency of strong versions, but I've noticed that when you have a normal preempt, you'll experience more trouble as well. In those situations you really want to bid natural.

[inquiry]

Well, I see more and more transfer preempts. For instance, I know that Russ Ekeblad and Ron Rubin use 3C as weak tranfer to 3D, 3S as weak transfer to 3H, and 2NT as weak transfer to "a minor" I think, since they seem to have either. I have not seen a 3H opening bid by them, presumably it is not spades, as they alert their 2S bid as weak two or three spade bid. Their 3S bid seems to be a very good suit (AKQTxxx is the example I saw).

[inquiry]

So I think the real questions to be answered are:

 

(1) How much do you win/lose when you open a transfer preempt with a strong hand?

(2) How much do you win/lose when you open a transfer preempt with a weak hand?

I am willing to accept that, strong two suiters win in your case one, and by a fairly large margin. I am willing to accept that in case number 2, you have tilted the odds in your opponents favor a little bit when you hold the weak hand, but not as much as you may suspect. But because of the higher frequency of these bids, even a small amount will get amplified.

 

However, what you haven't factored in is a case #3. Where you DONT open 3C/3D/3H but show a strong two suiter naturally. Consider, this run of the mill auction....

 

1H-1S

3C...

 

and

 

1S-1NT (forcing)

3C...

 

How does not having the strong two suiter (however you minimum requirements apply) affect these auctions? You will be surprised.

 

Also since none of us like opening 2C with a strong two suiter, it also has some significant affects on 2C auctions where opener bids two suits (he can never have five plus in both suits).

 

So what I am suggesting is that it also provides wins on other auctions where you didn't open 3C/3D/3H as a strong two suiter, placing reasonable and definable limits on what these other bids show. And that has proven to be a big win for us, as we tick off in our heads the kind of hands partenr can have for his jump rebids based upon our own hand and bidding to date. It becomes much easier to visualize (since you will not invision a true monster).

 

Ben

[inquiry]

Traveller for Board 8 BBO tourneyment

 

Just ran across this little hand. Bidding the slam was worth 6imps in huge field.

[hv=d=w&v=n&n=sj98ht965daj986c8&w=sq764hjdkt754ct76&e=sakt53hk4dcakqj95&s=s2haq8732dq32c432]399|300|Scoring: IMP

West North East South

 

Pass Pass 3♣ Pass

3♦ Pass 4♠ Pass

4NT Pass 5♣    Pass

 5♥ Pass 5♠     Pass

6♠    All Pass

4S shows club-spade two suiter, with 2 losers. West with spade queen ALREADY knows at least 6S will be bid. Maybe heart singleton is useful, maybe king of diamonds is useful, so he explores this possibility. 4NT as always shows second round control in hearts. That is not useful, so opener bids 5C. At this point, responder can now try to see if his diamond king so he bids 5♥ (promising a diamond value). Again opener knows heart ace is missing and no diamond card will be useful,, so he signs off in 5S. Of course, responder carrie to slam disappointed that neither red suit value was useful. He could just bid 6S over 4S and not try for grand slam, but that seems timid.

[/hv]

 

 

 

[hrothgar]

Traveller for Board 8 BBO tourneyment

 

Just ran across this little hand. Bidding the slam was worth 6imps in huge field.

Three comments:

 

1. As noted earlier, displaying hands that suit your methods does very little to validate the transfer preempts. For Christs sake, if have a mechanism to show a 5-5 and 17+ HCP, you had better get decent results when these hands occur.

 

2. 40 pairs played this boards. 19 of the 20 were bid the slam. Me, I normally assume that standard methods would allow me to score in the top 50% of the field on BBO...

 

3. If you are actually interested in advancing this discussion, the most useful information that you could provide would be information regarding the relative frequencies of the different hand types. As I noted earlier, my back of the envelope estimation suggests that the strong 5-5 hand occurs approximately once in 400 hands. I would hope that you have a more accurate analysis available...

[inquiry]

Gee richard, if you don't want to participate please don't bother. I point out this hand because it was referred to me by an interested party. I neither played in this event nor kibitzed it...and it is not in bridgebrowser database yet. There was a hand in Jr Flght yesterday, and BridgeBrowser tourney last night that also would have worked out well. As I said, I have thousands of these hands, downloaded in order (aka random), I would gladly in groups of 20 to interested people who want to try them out. There are lucky slams where three finessess later, the slam makes that this method will miss. There are hands that belong at the two level that this method witll get too high on (usually based on total misfit and horrible splits, btw). But the vast majority work well.

 

As for this hand, sure many people bid this slam easily enough (or it would be more than 6 imps), but change openers hand to Heart Ax instead of Kx, how many would have found the grand slam? This method makes it easy. Look at the auctions that got them to six, most EAST just blasted once partner showed "support", hopeing not to lose two hearts or one heart and one spade.

 

So far, your contribution has been limited to some useful ideas on defense to the opening bid, and a general critisim that in your opinion the transfer preempt concept is so horrible it will never work (not in so many words). I got it. I understand your "feeling". But unlike you I am still exploring the usefulness of this bid, and not only as it deals to when you use it, but also to when you don;t.

 

 

The fact is, I am still working on five major issues.

1) Best way to explore usefulness of "maybe covers" (side AK, and things like doubletons and five card support).

2) Best way to show type of hand over interference (it turns out to be easy to get across the two suits, but you lose some flexibility in describing if you ahve two or three losers.

3) Best type of interfernce.

4) How bad is the disadvantage with weak openers.

5) Waht happens to other auctions when you don't open 3C/3D/3H

 

Ben

[hrothgar]

Gee richard, if you don't want to participate please don't bother. I point out this hand because it was referred to me by an interested party... So far, your contribution has been limited to some useful ideas on defense to the opening bid, and a general critisim that in your opinion the transfer preempt concept is so horrible it will never work (not in so many words). I got it. I understand your "feeling". But unlike you I am still exploring the usefulness of this bid, and not only as it deals to when you use it, but also to when you don;t.

 

The fact is, I am still working on five major issues.

1) Best way to explore usefulness of "maybe covers" (side AK, and things like doubletons and five card support).

2) Best way to show type of hand over interference (it turns out to be easy to get across the two suits, but you lose some flexibility in describing if you ahve two or three losers.

3) Best type of interfernce.

4) How bad is the disadvantage with weak openers.

5) Waht happens to other auctions when you don't open 3C/3D/3H

 

Ben

The issue that I am trying to hammer home is related to the analytic frameworks that can be used to evaluate these types of methods...

 

From my perspective, the key issues to understand are

 

1. Relative frequencies of hand types. I'll ask, yet again, whether you can provide any kind of estimate... I find it astounding that you would devote so much time and effort worrying about complex auction continuations, but you can't provide such a simple piece of information.

 

2. Whether the methods have a positive expected value ...

 

3. The relationship between the variance and the frequency of the methods. I'm perfectly happy to adopt high variance methods like "Frelling Two Bids", so long as these methods also have a reasonably high frequency. I need the opening to come up multiple times each session to dampen out the swings...

[awm]

I've run this through my hand generator.

 

Hands with at least 5-5 in two suits and 4 or fewer losers:

 

826 out of 100,000 hands.

 

Of course, these are the first seat odds. Someone has one of these hands at the table almost four times more often than this, but sometimes they face an opening in front of them, etc. This is substantially more frequent than I thought it would be when I first read Ben's posts.

 

In contrast, how frequent are the weak three openings? It's hard to quantify because this depends a lot on partnership style (how often do you open weak 3 on six cards? are there any loser requirements? suit quality requirements? how does vulnerability effect things?) The simulation I ran was the following:

 

Weak three bids have between 4 and 10 hcp, exactly 7 cards in the longest suit, and 7 or fewer losers (note xx x xxx KQxxxxx has 7 losers so the loser requirement is not ridiculous). No specific suit quality requirements. No requirements not to have 4 cards in a side major, etc.

 

Under these constraints, weak three bids came up 1652 times out of 100,000 hands.

 

Of course, your mileage may vary. If you open a lot of six baggers at the three level then these openings will obviously be more frequent for you. If you drop the 7-card suit requirement completely (keeping the points and losers requirements and allow any 6+ cards) then the weak three bids come up 6401 times out of 100,000 hands.

 

So it seems the ratio of strong hands to weak (in first seat anyway) is between 1:2 and 1:8 depending on just how aggressively you open at the three level. Ben commented in his post that it was 1:3 or 1:4 which seems reasonable based on a "normal" preempt style.

 

This doesn't answer the questions though, because we really have to quantify the wins/losses. Ben's posted a lot of examples which support wins on the strong hands, although it would be interesting to know what proportion of the strong hands are relatively flat (i.e. he's given examples where the method wins, but I bet there are a fair number out there where the field is in a flat game or slam). The big question though, is how big are the losses when you open the normal preempt hands. Again this is hard to figure because you can't normally "just look at the hands" without considering the opponents defensive methods, etc. Perhaps Ben has some examples of hands he played (actually using the transfer preempts) in competition with weak hands? Even so, I expect that opening a transfer preempt with a weak hand is actually a win against weak opposition who don't have a good defense! So sample hands from BBO tourneys etc. may not help much here either.

[chicken]

in my opinion this is definately a brownsticker convention, good for this site and

A-Level tourneys, but not allowed in 90% of the tourneys all over the world. as far as i know (and i play X-fer preempts with str 2-suiter option as well) wbf calls this a hum convention as long as no anchor suit (dont know the precise technical term in english) is announced.

Total rubbish! The anchor suit is only needed for a weak version, so the preempt suit is known (transferred). Apparently you need to read the rules, because you don't even know what kind of system YOU play.

although i dont like the tone of ur reply u may be right. however when we first played a rather similar sys we were penalized by the german bridge federation. the TD told us that there must be an anchor suit for both variants. so since then we played 3club = weak diamonds or STR 2-suiter with diamonds and so on. this might be a specific german ruling, or the TD was silly. obviously the rulings seem to differ a lot.

[inquiry]

I think I quantified the hand frequency where the opening bid is made from online bridge using bridgebrowser already in this thread.

 

Bridgebrowser has a dozen or so databases, some form okbridge, four from open room on BBO, three from tournments on BBO. When I run this program, I haven't figured out how to define look for number of losers, so I set min number of hcp, controls, and two suiter 5-5 or better. This turns up between 1.6 and 2.0% (depending on if you use 15hcp or 16 hcp as minimum and 4 or 5 controls as minumum). But, not all these hand have 4 or less losers. Some have five and occaassionally six. So lets be generrous and estimate that half have two many losers or too poor a major suit to open 3C/3D/3H, you are looking at a frequency of 0.8% to 1.0% of all hands.

 

Ok, I admit this is an approximate, I ahve found thousands of unique hands, but I have not plowed through all of them to see if thye have four losers or five. This approach includes as a non-match any hand where someone opens before you get a chance. This means at some table, someone might open light in front of this hand so you don't get a chance (shows up as a non-hand), while at others, the person passed in front of the strong hands so it counts. So, let;s consider this a real world frequency. Compare this with the real world frequency of an opening bid of 3C/3D/3H/3S. I did the same test, but instead simply asked for an opening bid of 3 of a suit, limiting opener only to 11 hcp or less (no legnth requirement). The frequency on a large test of over 1 million deals was 2.3%. This number needs no correction per se, as it is what is was. This includes frequency of such bids at all vulnerabilities, and includes reckless preempts and ultra conservative ones. I would think my rate slightly higher, but we will go with the measured rate here.

 

So the it is 0.9% of all hands strong (maybe slight unbid as 1/2 is a lot to throw out), and 2.3% of hands (may be less than what you would preempt with, but vul versus not, preempt are rare at imps, andmost of those were imp hands). So out of 3.2 such opening bids at this 28% would be strong, 72% weak, or nearly 4 out of 10. I am surprised at this number myself, I think because people don't preempt enough, or I underestimated the frequency of light opening bids or line prior to preempts, or I underestimated rate of vul preempts (indeed frequency of vul preempts turns out be only 1.5% over half a million hands).

 

So this is the third time I have provide a frequecy of these hands (justin and I discussed them in the other thread), amw has done so a couple of times as well. Experience shows they happen often enough, and EVEN MIORE importantly, they limit the jumpshifts by opener (which happen even more frequently).

 

Does the method have an expected positive value. This is harder to estimate, I guess. What would you accept as a reasonable trial? Would the first 250 hands that fit an opening bid of 3C/3D/3H/3S meet your requirement? How do we handle competition on these hands? What if opening lead makes a difference? Would PAr result using JACK to figure it out be acceptible to YOU? I have already satisfied myself that the net plus when strong is quite healthy.

 

As for the downside. It is clear that opening bids of 3C/3D/3H/3S is a winner (bridgebase shows after thousands of such bids, opening side with >50% for each and positive imps score for each (small plus each case). If enough people would adopt Misiry (my new nickname for this based on first three letters of Misho and last three letters of inquiry)... we could run such statistics.

 

I suspect playing moscito or other strong club system the need to open 3C/3D/3H as transfer preempt strong two suiter is much reduced. You can force quite nicely without it, and your jumpshift rebids after opening, say 1H are already limited by not opening 1C.

[hrothgar]

Here's what I would recommend for evaluating expected gain/loss for the "weak" variant of the transfer preempts.

 

You need some mechanism to automatically generate large numbers of hands. I've typically done this through scripting.

 

I use a deal generator to generate hands.

I use a bidding script to automate the auction

I use a double dummy solver to evaluate the final contract

 

In this case, I'd contrast a standard 3 level preemptive opening with a standard defense as opposed to the transfer preemptive opening and an "optimal" defense...

 

Generate a 1000 hands and compare results...

 

In an ideal world, the double dummy solver would be able to take inferences from the auction, but this is way beyond any of the scripting that my friends will do for me...

[Free]

in my opinion this is definately a brownsticker convention, good for this site and

A-Level tourneys, but not allowed in 90% of the tourneys all over the world. as far as i know (and i play X-fer preempts with str 2-suiter option as well) wbf calls this a hum convention as long as no anchor suit (dont know the precise technical term in english) is announced.

Total rubbish! The anchor suit is only needed for a weak version, so the preempt suit is known (transferred). Apparently you need to read the rules, because you don't even know what kind of system YOU play.

although i dont like the tone of ur reply u may be right. however when we first played a rather similar sys we were penalized by the german bridge federation. the TD told us that there must be an anchor suit for both variants. so since then we played 3club = weak diamonds or STR 2-suiter with diamonds and so on. this might be a specific german ruling, or the TD was silly. obviously the rulings seem to differ a lot.

I didn't mean to offend you in any way, and I still don't want to...

 

I doubt that the description of "brown sticker convention" and "hum" are different in some countries (what's the WBF for?). However, some countries just add specific rules, like "rule of 18", or specify what kind of 'psychs' are allowed, or forbid 1-level openings with less than 8HCP, or many other stuff.

 

When one needs transfer preempts with an anchor suit in both possibilities (whenever you're weak or strong) are easily modified, just always show the transferred suit...

[inquiry]

Ok, let's forget the for a minute all the different opener's rebids. Instead lets deal with one specific auction and how the bidding will continue to see how the system works in a simple format.

 

As I said earlier, i have coined the term Misiry for Misho - Inquiry. True Misiry is the preemptive hands. Then, we have Misiry loves company hands which re the big hands. So, let's examine this specific auction, opponents silent

 

3C-3D-3H. Here, the 3H rebids shows Exactly four losers and at least 10 cards in the majorss. Responder counts his covers and decides if he should signoff in partscore, game, slam or grand slam. Or, if he has potential cover cards, he can cooperate with opener to see if the potential covers are working.

 

The first "maybe " cover cards are CONTROLs in the non-anchor suits. After you determine their usefulness, you can ask about wayward sisiters (two anchor suit queens).

 

If responder is uncertain if one or more of his potential cover cards is "good" or not, he can explore by misiry cue-bids and then search for wayward sisters. The misiry cue-bid is where responders first option is to bid in a non-anchor suit where he lacks any potential cover card (SEE THE VERY RARE EXCEPTION LATER0. If two quick tricks are off in the misiry bid suit, opener bids the cheapest anchor suit as pass/correct. Let;s see how this works on our example auction

 

3C-3D-3H-?

• Pass = I have hearts and not even one cover card
  
• 3♠ = I prefer spades, and I lack even 1 cover card
  
• 3NT = to play, I know you have a two suiter, but, I think this is best
  
• 4[cll] = I lack club ACE, King, singleton, or void
  
• 4♦ = I have A, K, singleton or void in clubs, but no such holding in diamonds
  
• 4♥ = I have one or two cover cards and hearts. If two, I don't hold possible cover for a wayward queen
  
• [4sp] = same as 4♥, but I prefer spade to hearts
  
• 4NT = I have diamond king, and a control in clubs, can be Ace or King.
  
• 5♣ I have ace of diamonds and king of clubs
  
• 5♦ = I have AK in one non-anchor and A in the other. It doesn't matter which.
  

In general, after the misiry cue-bid opener may want to ask about the control in the other off suit, especially if a suit bypassed. We use the cheapest non-anchor suit bid (which can include pass if the opponents intefere) to ask about the controls in the other suit. On an auction where a suit is bypassed, like a 4D bid here, a 4S bid would ask about the nature of the club control. Opener ONLY ASK in theory if the club KING is wasted. Responder typically signs off with the club king, and continues with the ACE. This is important, if OPENER doesn't ask about the other anchor suit, he must either know which is held, or either control is a cover card (xx in opener hand). This later case is important as it means with AK in a bypassed suit, both are working!!

 

If partner DOESN'T skip a suit, the meaning of simpliest non-signoff is the same, only the ACE in the other suit is useful. Any other bid (besides cheapest signoff and cheapest non-signoff) shows any cover in the other suit is useful. So after the initial misiry cue-bid and opener's response to it, responder is well positioned to determine how useful his noin-anchor suit cover cards are. Let's examine some partial hands to see how this works (I will show only the non-achor suits - clubs and diamonds)..

 

Now, what if opener doesn't issue the one step warning that "other suit" king is wasted? The next bids are conventional.

 

D-Kxx   

C-xxx

3C-3D-3H-4C-4H

1.   Here, 4H is a warning, we are off two clubs. You stop, pass 4♥ or move to 4♠

3C-3D-3H-4C-4S

2.   Here 4S says, no two club losers, but since it is the cheapest non-signoff, it issues a warning that only diamond ACE would be a cover, so you don't count the diamond King as a cover card. Easy?

3C-3D-3H-4C-4N

3.   4N says that all is ok and gives responder a chance to show potential covers for wayward queens. And if room exist below five of the cheapest anchor suit, opener can show grand slam potential (no quick loser in either non-achor suit) and where coverage for a wayward queen would be an extra cover. Here you would count diamond King as full cover, and diamond AK as two full covers.

 

So what is a wayward queen? xx in one anchor suit with adequate support for the other, or xxxxx in one of the anchor suits. Over 4NT responder can bid 5C/5D to show coverage for wayward queen in lower (5C) and higher suit (5D). If opener was going to try for grand slam, he could have bid 5C and 5D as well, with the same meaning. Opener can jump to 5H to show either substitute queen is working.

 

This appoach allows you to explore if specific covers exist.. consider this hand by opener....

 

AKJxx

AKT9x

x

Kx

 

Let's see some auctions..all start 3C-3D-3H (major 2 suiter, 4 losers)

 

3C-3D-3H-4C-4D-4H <<--- 4C denied club control, 4D asked about diamonds (cheapest non-signout other non-anchor ask), 4H was signoff, no diamond ACE.

 

3C-3D-3H-4C-4D-4N <--- working diamond ACE, no substitute queen, now opener can ask for four card support if missing one.

 

3C-3D-3H-4D-5H-6S<<--- 4D promised ACE or king of clubs, denied ace of diamond or king of diamonds, Five diamonds showed missing both queens. 6S shows a substitute queen of spades (length) or queen of diqamonds (shortness).

 

This gives an idea how this works. Looks like Misiry is good name for it.. :-)

 

Ben

[fred]

Well, I see more and more transfer preempts. For instance, I know that Russ Ekeblad and Ron Rubin use 3C as weak tranfer to 3D, 3S as weak transfer to 3H, and 2NT as weak transfer to "a minor" I think, since they seem to have either. I have not seen a 3H opening bid by them, presumably it is not spades, as they alert their 2S bid as weak two or three spade bid. Their 3S bid seems to be a very good suit (AKQTxxx is the example I saw).

Russ and Ronnie use 3H as weak with both majors. They are my regular teammates so I am in a good position to tell you that they have had a couple of impressive results with this convention (not that this proves anything).

 

Russ loves talking system and I am sure he would be happy to answer any questiosn you might have about their (very interesting) methods.

 

Fred Gitelman

Bridge Base Inc.

www.bridgebase.com

[whereagles]

3H as both majors is actually a though nut to crack on 2nd seat because you can never be sure it will be passed out or not. Tremendous pressure because you're given a chance to be passive or active and both can turn out terribly well or terribly wrong.

 

Still, technically it shouldn't be too hard to defend because you definitely don't want to play in one of the majors (you might want to do that if it were 2H showing a 44 major or better), so you have a couple of bids available:

 

3H ..?

 

X = good balanced hand, penalty oriented

3NT = natural, usually based on a long minor

3S = 54 minors either way or 55, good hand

4m = natural, very good hand

4NT = 55 minors, very good hand

4M = 55 minors, very good hand, void

Pass + double = penalties

 

The problem would be to judge at table which action is best.

[pclayton]

Checking in late on this discussion as usual......

 

This whole argument about 'frequency' relating to Ben's multi-preempts is hogwash.

 

Just because a hand with a preempt hand comes up (say) 5x times more often than the strong 2-suited variety is irrelevant. Usually the responder to the transfer preempt will just accept the transfer and play it there. Positionally, its better for the long suit to be on the table, so transfer preempts will frequently gain in this scenario.

 

Even when responder does hold a hand that wants to bounce, frequently, the preempter's LHO will have taken a call anyway. Responder will usually be able to guess what hand pattern partner has judging by what action the direct seat takes. I'd say that responder is only at a slight disadvantage.

 

Ergo, the only real positive gain for standard natural preempts is when the call gets past preempter's LHO and preempter's RHO has a monster. Having to guess at the 4 or 5 level is a lot tougher than taking a shot at the 3 level while the multi-transferer works out his hand pattern.

 

I will also admit that its problematic for the responder to psyche over one of these multi preempts. :blink:

 

I don't think responder is at any less of a disdvantage then when the partnership uses a traditional multi 2♦ (either weak 2 in major or a 2N opening). Responder is very limited on the amount of 'bouncing' he is able to do, since opener can have THREE hand types. As I understand Ben's system, opener is limited to basically two types: a normal preempt or a strong 2 suiter with a known anchor suit.

 

__________________________________

 

I think I'm going to explore these further. I'm flabbergasted that the ACBL allows these as mid-chart, I would think they wouldn't be allowed at all.

 

For a pair that plays a strong club, I think these fill a very important role. Strong 2 suiters are very vulnerable to preemption after Opener has to use a strong ♣. Even if the opponents don't get busy in the auction, frequently, opener can't sort out the suits until the 3 or 4 level anyway, so the 'constructive' sequences gains very little.

 

Multi-preempts would also gel very nicely with my 2♣ opening. Two suiters frequently get lost after 2♣ - 2♠ / 2N / 3♣ (3,4 and 5 controls) response, so these would aid greatly.

 

The need for a natural jump shift by opener seems to be all but eliminated. These could be converted over to mini-splinters, or the weaker distributional 5-5 or 6-5 hands.

 

I would be careful with 5-5-0-3 patterns. I can see how the fragment can get easily lost after a multi-preempt.

 

I will follow this thread with interest..........

[hrothgar]

Checking in late on this discussion as usual......

 

This whole argument about 'frequency' relating to Ben's multi-preempts is hogwash.

 

Just because a hand with a preempt hand comes up (say) 5x times more often than the strong 2-suited variety is irrelevant.

If you methods cause you to win 16 IMPs 5% of the time, but lose 2 IMPs, 95% of the time, then by definition, the expected value for the method is

 

(16*.05) + (-2*.95) = .8 - 1.9 = -1.1 IMPS each time the opening crops up...

 

Care to explain why the relative frequency of the hand types is "Hogwash"?

[hrothgar]

Usually the responder to the transfer preempt will just accept the transfer and play it there. Positionally, its better for the long suit to be on the table, so transfer preempts will frequently gain in this scenario.

 

Even when responder does hold a hand that wants to bounce, frequently, the preempter's LHO will have taken a call anyway. Responder will usually be able to guess what hand pattern partner has judging by what action the direct seat takes. I'd say that responder is only at a slight disadvantage.

The issue regarding the transfer preempt is NOT related to the constructive response structure, but rather to defensive methods...

 

Transfer opening bids provide the opponents with enormous amounts of additional bidding space. Given that you've just opened at the three level, my preference would be to use this space to provide a healthy range of penalty oriented measures...

 

In short, we're gonna rip you apart when its right and still be able to show a wide variety of constructive hands...

[pclayton]

Checking in late on this discussion as usual......

 

This whole argument about 'frequency' relating to Ben's multi-preempts is hogwash.

 

Just because a hand with a preempt hand comes up (say) 5x times more often than the strong 2-suited variety is irrelevant.

If you methods cause you to win 16 IMPs 5% of the time, but lose 2 IMPs, 95% of the time, then by definition, the expected value for the method is

 

(16*.05) + (-2*.95) = .8 - 1.9 = -1.1 IMPS each time the opening crops up...

 

Care to explain why the relative frequency of the hand types is "Hogwash"?

The prior arguments for

 

"are multi-preempts good"

 

vs

 

"are multi-preempts bad"

 

 

were based on a function of frequency. I would argue that frequency of the event has little to do with the outcome, since there are mitigating factors that are very difficult to quantify.

 

Richard, your idea about sampling 100 (or 1000) hand makes sense however, since you will come up with an aggregate total of gains vs losses, since each hand can be be evaluated on its own merits.

 

But to say method A wins "x" IMPs "y"% of the time (vs method B ) is the wrong approach.

[pclayton]

Usually the responder to the transfer preempt will just accept the transfer and play it there. Positionally, its better for the long suit to be on the table, so transfer preempts will frequently gain in this scenario.

 

Even when responder does hold a hand that wants to bounce, frequently, the preempter's LHO will have taken a call anyway. Responder will usually be able to guess what hand pattern partner has judging by what action the direct seat takes. I'd say that responder is only at a slight disadvantage.

The issue regarding the transfer preempt is NOT related to the constructive response structure, but rather to defensive methods...

 

Transfer opening bids provide the opponents with enormous amounts of additional bidding space. Given that you've just opened at the three level, my preference would be to use this space to provide a healthy range of penalty oriented measures...

 

In short, we're gonna rip you apart when its right and still be able to show a wide variety of constructive hands...

Well, certainly....

 

In Preempts A-Z, a defense to Namyats is discussed (I think its this - I don't have a copy at hand):

 

After an opening 4♣ call (showing ♥'s):

 

Double: Cooperative

Direct 4♥: Takeout of hearts

Direct 4♠: Stronger 4♠ call

 

After the 4♥ conversion:

 

Double: Penalty

4♠: Weaker (sac?) than direct 4♠

 

 

Its curious that the argument now is focused on transfer preempts in general, rather than Ben's multi structure. If given a choice, I prefer transfer preempts, but the added two-suiter is a net bonus, especially in my system architecture.

[hrothgar]

The prior arguments for

 

"are multi-preempts good"

 

vs

 

"are multi-preempts bad"

 

were based on a function of frequency. I would argue that frequency of the event has little to do with the outcome, since there are mitigating factors that are very difficult to quantify.

Comment 1: My argument was related to the relative frequency of the weak single suited hand relative to the strong 2 suited hand pattern.

 

Comment 2: The frequency of events actually has a very large impact on their viability:

 

Case in point: Assume for the moment that you are considering playing the "Hibernian" 3♦. This opening is wonderous thing. Your expected gain from the Hibernian 3♦ is +2 IMPs any time the hand comes up. However, there is a catch... The Hibernian 3♦ opening is very much a top or bottom sort of bid. 50% of the time that this bid comes up, you expect to win 16 IMPs. However, the other 50% of the time, you expect to lose 12 IMPs.

 

My willingness to play this method would very much depend on its frequency. Assume for the moment that the bid came up once per session. That -12 IMPs means that every other session, we expect to be knocked out of contention because the Hibernian 3♦ opening backfired. In contrast, lets assume that the frequency of the convention was such that it came up 4 times per session. In this case, adopting the convention becomes MUCH more attractive since the frequency of the event dampens the variance...